Suchergebnisse

The review article of the anthology David ČENĚK – Tereza PO- RYBNÁ (eds.), Vizuální antropologie – kultura žitá a viděná [Visual Anthro- pology – Culture Experienced and Seen]. Pavel Mervart: Červený Kostelec 2010, 332 pp., identifies several tendencies that shape the role of technical images in the contemporary social sciences. The first part of the review sums up the content of the anthology and contextualize it within the debates in visual social sciences. Subsequently, it discusses mainly three following issues: the critique of the subject-object relation and the proposals for its transformation; the emergence of the so-called participatory methods; and the claims for the produc- tion of outside-text representations and the constitution of shared anthropology. The article proceeds by the following order: first it describes and illustrates an issue as it is dealt with in the reviewed anthology and then it outlines the broader discussions within social sciences. Finally, the review article focuses on the consequences of digitization and hypermedialization for the discussed issues.

The present study focuses on the impact which the vast, fundamental changes in biology of the late 19th and early 20th century had in the Czech Lands. Until the WWI, there existed several distinct and often mutually contradictory theories of evolution of organisms. In the Czech Lands, this multitude of theoretical explanations was complemented by a multi-layered cultural and scientific environment, where Czech and German biology influenced each other and met at various autonomous institutions. One should also keep in mind the differences between Prague and Brno, each a local centre with its scientific traditions and independent links to both Vienna and other European universities. The main subject of this paper are the theoretical biologists who had long-term impact on Czech biological thought or influenced it directly by working here. In about 1900-1915, we witness the first clear and recognised peak in the Czech reception of evolutionism.

The history of eugenics and racial nationalism in Central and Southeast Europe is a neglected topic of analysis in contemporary scholarship. The 20 essays in this volume, written by distinguished scholars of eugenics and fascism alongside a new generation of scholars, excavate the hitherto unknown eugenics movements in Central and Southeast Europe, including Austria and Germany. Eugenics and racial nationalism are topics that have constantly been marginalized and rated as incompatible with local national traditions in Central and Southeast Europe. These topics receive a new treatment here. On the one hand, the historiographic perspective connects developments in the history of anthropology and eugenics with political ideologies such as racial nationalism and anti-Semitism; on the other hand, it contests the 'Sonderweg' approach adopted by scholars dealing with these issues